JASMINE DREAME WAGNER

Threshing

Reduced to one note,
the low-lit violet
of kudzu and hollyhock.

Virginia creeper, Martha
Washington rose, crab apple
shed among porcupine

quills, splintered husks
of chestnuts like sea urchins,
split inexactly in the August

thunder, do you remember
the slender navy needle
of the wasp, how it angled

into the folds of our tent?
The syrup of the begonias
viscous in the humidity,

blue rime of oxidized
copper liming the hose
distilled to umber, hills

at daybreak, morning
glories with pursed mouths,
plums that hung like knuckles.

How unusual an insect
before dawn, it must have sensed
the candle, the damp linen,

the bowl of long-grain
rice like the teeth of animals
left in the sun to dry.